Dear Parents of Mine
by Party-In-France's-Pants
Summary: Fanboy suffers through another day dedicated to celebrating parents.


It was that time of year again. Well, actually, _that_ time of year came twice. They were great days for most others, but for him, it was anything but happy. He had started to feel like this many years ago. He never uttered a word about it though, not even to his best friend that knew almost everything about him. He kept the pain locked away inside. He'd only release the terrible feeling at night... when he was alone...

"Kyle!"

The fifteen-year-old mage turned around to see Yo running up to him. "What is it?"

Yo stopped just short of him to catch her breath. "Have you noticed anything _weird_ about Fanboy lately?"

Kyle raised an eyebrow at her. "You should really try being more specific. What about the boy isn't weird any time of the year?"

"I'm being serious!" She stamped her foot on the ground, startling Kyle. "Francine just told me something I think you should know..."

Kyle tilted his head to the side. He truly couldn't think of anything that would bother the teen or anything that would trouble him. Everyone knew him as just being happy-go-lucky, always smiling. "Well, what is it?"

Yo cleared her throat, trying to get the right words together. "You know how today's Mother's Day right?"

That wasn't how she wanted to start it, but it was a good place to begin she supposed.

"Well, no duh. That's the reason why we were forced to make those god-awful cards that mothers find adorable."

That also wasn't the reply she was hoping for, but it was good enough... especially from Kyle.

"Anyway," she continued through clenched teeth, "Francine had went to the back to go meet up with her mom, when she saw Fanboy sitting by himself on the stairs. He had his arms wrapped around his knees, and he was hiding his face. But here's the weird part, he was _crying_."

Kyle had only seen the teen cry twice. Both times had pretty good excuses for a reason to burst into tears. Almost being eaten by a dinosaur and nearly getting stuck on a convenience store roof sounded excusable to him, and he should know. He was there both times. Taking that information into account, Kyle assumed that he must have had something that bad happen to him in order to make a boy like him be reduced to tears.

"Was Chum Chum with him?"

Yo grabbed Kyle's shoulders and turned him around to face the opposite direction. Chum Chum was talking with a few parents who cooed about how adorable they found the fourteen-year-old. Yo turned him back around to face her.

"He's hiding from his own best friend while crying!" Yo pointed out.

"Yes, I see that, but, why did you ask me about Mother's Day?"

The Asian girl searched her memories of being in school. "One time on Father's Day, we were all making cards for our dads. Oh, by the way, this was before you were around. Everyone was talking about how cool they thought there dads were. Except Fanboy. He only sat in his desk, staring at the floor, and had his face hidden from everyone. I sat close to him. Sometimes I swear I could hear him sniffle."

"Maybe he got into a fight with his father are something."

Yo shot him a quick glare. "Kyle! You and I both know that's impossible!"

"What is it about these two days that makes you automatically assume there's something wrong?!"

"I've only seen him act this way on those two days! That's why! It's beginning to bother me."

Kyle himself was actually becoming curious about the topic. He had to admit that he always wondered where Fanboy's parental figures were. Oz definitely didn't come close to being one in his own opinion. Lenny and Boog couldn't stand his existence. Manarctica was, well, just an icon for him. Maybe if he had his parents... Maybe if he had them... Would he turn out the way he did?

Kyle ignored all of his thoughts on it. "Yo, please think rationally about this! I'm positive that there is some explanation as to where his parents are."

"Then what is it?"

"H-How should _I_ know?!"

Little did they know, Yo was actually right. Something was wrong. Something terrible that brought tears the young boy's eyes every time he thought about it. It would make his stomach churn with the most grotesque feeling. His head would ache just from thinking about it for too long or too little. No one knew what it was but him, or at least he would like to believe that.

Fanboy slid his legs apart to look at his shoes. He sniffed and watched the tears drip off his chin and drop onto his shoes. The salty liquid would then slide down his slightly dirty shoes, clearing a path through the dirt.

"Hey, Fanboy!"

He jumped when he heard his best friend calling out to him. Fanboy wiped away his tears onto his jacket sleeve and practiced making a fake, but believable, smile.

"Yeah?" Fanboy's voice was broken.

"I'm going to go spend the rest of the day at my aunt's with Muk Muk, alright?"

Fanboy's smile faded. "Uh sure. That's just umm fine!"

"Okay! See you later!" Chum Chum waved at his friend and leader before skipping away towards the car that held his semi-feral cousin.

Fanboy went back to doing what he had been doing since they arrived at school. He had managed to calm himself down a little, but now that Chum Chum had left, he felt like he was even more alone. A caring hand gently touched his shoulder. He didn't bother trying to see who it was.

"It's okay, Tobias." The familiar voice of a woman whispered into his ear.

"I'm fine!" He lied.

"Tobias, you don't have to be like this every year. If you don't want Chum Chum to come with us, he doesn't have to."

He looked over his shoulder at the woman who was Chum Chum's aunt. A chord in her heart was struck when she saw the boy's eyes. Fanboy stood up, shaking as he did, and told her he'll just go home. She watched him walk away with his hood over his head and his hands in his pockets. She knew there was no use in stopping him.

Fanboy dragged his feet along the cement of the sidewalk, staring at the ground as he made his short journey back home. He passed by many Mother's Day advertisements that pictured a happy mother with her child. He glanced at each one he walked by. Even though he despised the holiday and dreaded its arrival every year, there was something about the ads that he liked. The innocent advertisements would only fuel his imagination about his own mother. He would sometimes picture the child in the ad as himself.

He noticed happy mothers and fathers pass by him. He would always get jealous of the way dads held their sons on their shoulders, treating them like a super hero, helping them pretend they could fly.

With all the painful thoughts and actions taking place outside, he was happy to finally reach his infamous water-tower. Fanboy lazily pushed the large yellow door that was in the shape of his head. He already figured out what he would spend the rest of his day doing. Sitting in bed and sobbing like a huge baby. It was what he did every year for as long as he could remember. And its what he'll keep doing every year.

Fanboy dragged himself up the stairs that led to the make-shift bedroom. He crawled into his bed and grabbed a pillow. He wasn't going to use it for his head. He would use it as a comfort item, something to hold onto while he cried his poor little eyes out.

A few hours had gone by painfully slow, and it had become dark outside. Yet still, Fanboy lay on his bed in the same position, in the same spot. If anyone were to see his face at that moment, they would've assumed that he was angry due to the way his brows were knitted together and how his overbite was digging into the pillow. He wasn't furious. Maybe a little but not that much.

Thought after thought piled into his head as he stared at Chum Chum's empty bed and at the wall not too far behind it. There was a wet spot in the sheets just below his face where all of his tears fallen and got soaked up by the fabric. The pillow was even damp thanks to his need to bite into it as a way of muffling his sobbing. None of that bothered him. What he was focused on blurred out any other thoughts.

Fanboy had what every kid wished for. He lived with only his best friend and no parental guidance to speak of. Well, Kyle did feel like a mother with the way he nagged at him all the time, but still, he didn't really act the way he imagined his mother would do so towards him. Fanboy could stay up all night and sleep all day without anyone saying otherwise. He could pull off crazy and dangerous stunts without someone telling him that he shouldn't. There was no one who would see his grades and punish him for all of his F's and D's. _No _one...

Those two words were engraved into his brain. They were also located in the spot his parents would be in his heart if they were present. It filled the empty void with sadness and depression. The kind that would take several years to be replaced with love and warmth.

Everyone always felt that they knew the boy, but they didn't know that he wasn't as happy as he pretended to be when it came to his parents. He wanted someone to punish him for making bad grades in school, and he wanted someone to tell him to go to bed after he had stayed up until two in the morning. He had no idea what things like that felt like. He had only heard his fellow classmates complain about them. They would complain about the way their mothers would take away certain privileges if they didn't behave correctly or do something right. He wanted to know what that was like so badly.

The more he wanted, the more he realized. His childhood was completely different from everyone else's. He was missing the most important thing in his life. His grandfather, Grandboy, would tell him stories about his dad's childhood and what his relationship with his mother was like. Those stories were used in his imagination. He found some amount of peace, no matter how small, in guessing what his parents were like. Though he found it odd that his grandpa never told him about his parents after and when he was born. It made him believe that something so terrible happened that he doesn't want him to know about it.

Fanboy's eyes began to water again. He remembered every single last story he was told. He pictured the way his parents looked and acted based on those more than true tales of before he was born. The teen knew their names but not their faces. Of course, his dad's name was Tobias Crannaple II. He was named after his dad, just like Fanboy had been named after him. He remembered how he would always say that he promised to name his future son Tobias Crannaple IV. He even made a secret promise to himself that he would always be there for his son. He may have not had the slightest idea how someone would go about raising a child, considering the fact he raised himself, but he would make sure to try his hardest.

As more tears found their way onto the white fabric under his face, Fanboy hugged the pillow closer to his chest. He bet that every other kid in Galaxy Hills was getting a kiss goodnight from their parents and being told about how much their loved. He bet that was one of the best feelings in the world. The only people he ever heard that from and said it to were Chum Chum and his grandparents. There was always that missing gap where _they_ should be.

Fanboy sobbed even louder, his face completely buried in the pillow. All he wanted to know was his parents. Who they were, what they were, what did they think of him, where did they go, why weren't they with him where they belonged. Was that too much to ask? It was all so unfair.

His eyelids became heavy, and his eyes hurt from crying so much. And so that night, Fanboy went to sleep with both negative and positive thoughts about his absent parents. He would wake up tomorrow acting like his normal self though, and no one even know that he had cried himself to sleep for another year in a row. _No one_.

Moments after he had fallen into a deep sleep, two figures slowly opened the door, and tip toed up the stairs, making sure not to make any sounds at all. No matter how badly they wanted him to know, he just couldn't. They walked up to the bed where the sleeping teen lay.

"This is becoming irritating..." The man spoke as he looked down at the bed.

"This is the only way." The woman reminded him and knelt down to be at face level with Fanboy.

She ran her hand through his reddish-brown hair and moved a few strands out of his face. Her red lips formed a sweet yet sorrowful smile.

"Can you believe what we do to him?" She asked the other, not looking for an actual reply.

He sat at the edge of the bed and glanced around the room silently.

"_We _put him through all this pain and misery..." She stated, on the verge of crying herself.

He turned to look at her and placed a hand on her cheek. "Its not your fault, Miranda. I blame myself everyday, but look at him."

She cupped the hand on her cheek with her own smaller, fragile one and looked into his eyes. She kissed his hand and returned her attention to Fanboy, still holding the onto him.

"It's incredible to know how much he takes after you." She said with a now broken smile.

The man got up and knelt beside her to get a good look at him. He tried to fight back the urge to smile but lost.

"Yeah. He definitely is a Crannaple." The man said with a small laugh.

"I wish he-"

"Miranda, don't make this anymore painful than it is."

She held his hand tighter. "I know, but it's just so hard..."

The woman placed a kiss on his tear stained cheek and whispered into his ear. "I love you more than anything. We both do."

She told him good night and got to her feet. She watched the man lean down to whisper something in his ear and stand back up. He told her it's best they leave now. She nodded and took one last look at the boy who was cuddling with the pillow. She blew a kiss at him and followed the man out of the water-tower.

"Mommy... Daddy..." He murmured in his sleep.

Fanboy jolted awake, his eyes quickly adjusted themselves to the darkness of the water-tower. His heart beat rapidly as he sat up in bed staring into nothing.

"Oh god... That was terrible..." He noticed the open front door. "That's weird I could of sworn I closed that."

He got out of bed against his body's protests and slammed the door shut. He crawled back into bed and pulled the blanket over him.

From outside, the two figures stood on top of a building located behind the Fanlair. Their capes, purple and blue, blew in the wind as the moon created back lighting for them. Kyle walked out of the Frosty Mart holding a bag of food he planned on feeding to his griffin when he noticed the two figures. He stared at them for a few seconds in total awe.

"Who are they- Huh?"

They disappeared in the blink of an eye. Kyle continued to stare at the place they were standing in, deciding whether or not he was going crazy or just seeing things.

OooOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

Well, that was terrible. I've actually once just thought that his mom and dad are in the apartments below the Fanlair or maybe they're dead and Fanboy is the next Batman.


End file.
